A glint of curiosity flashed in Vance’s turquoise eyes as he shrugged and told Lyssa, “Time doesn’t matter.”
Dayton spoke from behind them. “You should have acted sooner, Halsey.”
Mike held Lyssa’s gaze. “It wouldn’t matter if it was four years ago, right now, or forty years from now, Kringle. She’s mine.”
Still gripping her arm, Mike felt the frisson of awareness ripple through Lyssa. Beneath the red velvet covering her breasts, he’d bet her nipples were firm and sensitive to the touch. She might deny it if asked, but there was no ignoring the way he could arouse her body with a look or a touch. Lyssa didn’t find his caveman tactics and possessive behavior appealing, but her body responded to it. That he could work with, determined as he was. From the way she resisted his urgings to move toward the stairs, Mike doubted she’d succumb without a protest.
“Hold on.” She turned to glare up at him, ignoring the curious onlookers around them. “Who says I’m admitting anything?”
“You accepted
my
invitation, Lyssa.” Mike met her enmity calmly.
“I accepted
an
invitation. I never said I chose
you
for a partner.” She motioned to her costume. “I think it’s obvious I had someone else in mind.”
Mike moved into her space, crowding her up against the bar. “Then change it, pet, because I’m the
only
master you get.” He tilted his head and met Dayton’s gaze for an instant before returning his attention to Lyssa. “Ever.”
Mike felt a tremor flow through Lyssa’s body again as he tugged her away from the bar and led her toward the nearest staircase. Not two steps away from Dayton and the curious guests milling around the main lounge, Ben slid from his seat and blocked their progress.
“No forced play, Halsey.” The man’s gray eyes remained focused on Mike.
“We went through this four years ago, Murphy, but not this time.” Mike stepped closer, pulling Lyssa with him. Both men ignored Vance as he came forward to stand behind Ben’s right shoulder.
“If she doesn’t want to go—” Ben began.
“Rite of First Claim supersedes that rule,” Mike reminded him. He was sure the smile on his lips was smug. The muscles along Ben’s jaw flexed. Vance clenched his fists. Intent upon making it past Lyssa’s two guard dogs, Mike held steady, not backing down.
“She has the right to refuse,” Vance offered.
“Where’s the proof that I’m a threat to her physically?” Mike broke eye contact with Ben to look around the room at the Club’s visitors—doms, dommes, and subs—before dropping his gaze to Lyssa. “Have I ever physically harmed you, Lys? Ever abused you in any way?”
He felt Lyssa trembling beside him. Mike still remembered the ragged sobs that had shaken her frame as he’d loosened the extension cord from her wrists. She’d assured him then that she wasn’t harmed, just overwhelmed. The shattering orgasms they’d shared had shaken him as well, but he’d trusted her explanation for her tears.
Was she lying when I asked if I’d hurt her that night? Is she afraid of me
? A knot twisted in his gut. The expression she’d worn after he’d taken her home following their first encounter, before she’d locked herself in the bathroom, flashed through his mind.
Was I wrong? Should I have done something to make sure?
Ignoring the inquisitive gazes around them and the hostile ones from her pair of protectors, Mike pulled Lyssa tight against him and smoothed his fingers over her cheek. Bending close so only she and perhaps the two men closest to them could hear, he demanded, “Tell me you weren’t lying when you told me I hadn’t hurt you, baby.”
Lyssa hesitated, her gaze searching his for long, tense moments, before she finally answered, “I wasn’t lying. You’ve never hurt me physically, Mike.”
The tension in his neck and the constriction in his chest eased at her softly spoken answer. He could tell a part of her wished she had lied. But even if it made her life easier tonight, it wouldn’t have discouraged him from pursuing her. As much as she wanted to avoid her current predicament, the honorable core of her wouldn’t allow her to defame his character.
Assured she wouldn’t deny him, Mike turned back to Ben and Vance. “Satisfied?”
Ben looked past him and held Lyssa’s gaze for several seconds. Mike was sure the man would risk his membership by defying the oldest rule set down in the early days of the Club if she made any protest to Mike’s right to claim her as his submissive before any other dominant could.
When she gave a slight shake to her head, he knew she’d made her decision. Her hand flexed around his. Ben and Vance directed their nods at Lyssa more than Mike—acknowledgement of their acceptance of the choice she’d made. Even if they weren’t sure it was the right one.
Stepping past them, Mike headed toward the stairs. He felt Lyssa tense as they passed the open hatch leading to the area behind the bar. Was her mind conjuring the same images his did of the events of four years ago? If so, she would soon learn his goals had changed. Two hours of fucking in a closet, when less than a handful of people knew about it, would hardly satisfy the craving he had for her.
After tonight and before the end of the thirty days due him through Rite of First Claim, no one would doubt his ownership of her. Least of all Lyssa.
Chapter Three
“You can stop this right now.” Lyssa rounded on Mike the moment he shut the door. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears. She took in the decor while trying to regain some semblance of control. Everywhere she turned, she saw Mike and herself. Mirrors covered two walls and the doors of the armoire. What wasn’t covered with a reflective surface was painted a soft eggshell white and trimmed in silver. The two chairs near the window, the round table between them, and the king-size poster bed repeated the white and silver. Even the Berber carpet was white with flecks of silver sprinkled through the fibers.
Her reflection surrounded her—impossible to get away from or ignore. Harder to deny was the expression of mixed arousal and unease on her face as she watched Mike engage the lock and slip the key into the pocket of his trousers.
“What’s with the act?” she demanded. “You’ve ignored me and stayed away this long. Why change your mind now?”
“I’ve never ignored you, Lys.” Mike moved closer.
Lyssa took the same number of steps away from him. “You have—”
He silenced her protest with a look. “No, you’ve been running away. Every time I got too close. Every time I asked for something more than indifference, you ran.”
She stopped moving. Mike did too. “Uh-uh. I wasn’t the one running off to take pictures of the runway models in New York. I wasn’t the one—”
“No, I was the one who got treated to insults and denials or the sight of your back whenever we ended up in the same room for more than five minutes.” There was no heat in his voice, nothing to register his emotions.
Lyssa avoided looking in his eyes. Excitement bubbled through her body at the thought of being with Mike, but he’d never believe the excuses forming on her lips if he read the emotion in her gaze. “So why do anything about it tonight? What, are you pissed because I’ve decided to see what a real lover is like?”
“Not now. Not tonight. Not ever, Lyssa. No other lovers but me. Remember?”
“
No one but me touches you, Lys. Only my hands, my lips, my cock
.” The heated words he’d repeated in her ear while he made love to her in the Club’s storage closet whispered through her mind. Much as she hated to admit it, those words had affected the way her body reacted to other men if they made overtures. But damn it, there had to be a way out.
Lyssa listened to the soft cry of protest that sounded deep inside her at the thought of allowing herself to be vulnerable to this man again.
Remember the plan
! Mike had already proven once that she was an afterthought to him. If there was no place for her, there was no place in Mike’s life for a child. No way his jet-setting, here-today-gone-tomorrow lifestyle would ever include the baby she wanted. No. She needed to get out. Get away from him. Now.
“That line about claiming me was just show, right? A way to save face with all your dom friends? It’s just a lame excuse to make everyone think you actually give a damn. Right?”
Anger and forced disinterest had worked to push him away in the past. Fighting her own needs was going to prove more difficult. Already she could feel how excited she’d become simply because he’d publicly claimed her. But there was a big difference between claiming and keeping. No one knew that better than her. Especially where this man was concerned.
Mike ignored her question. “Strip.” The order came in a cool, amiable tone, even as his fingers pulled at the studs fastening his shirt. Her body quivered at the look in his eyes.
“The hell I will.” Her plans for the night were ruined; there was no reason she needed to stay. And she sure as hell wasn’t going to feed his ego by sticking around.
When she stepped toward the door, he blocked her. The dance started again. When she took a step one way, he matched her. With each step he took toward her, Lyssa moved back. She eased around the end of the bed as she watched him toss his black tuxedo jacket toward one of the nearby chairs and then remove the wide, black cummerbund. He slipped the black leather suspenders from his shoulders before he loosened the bow tie, removed it, and tucked into his trouser pocket. The studs fastening his shirt followed.
“This is a joke, right?” she asked, cursing the shaky tone of her voice.
“Strip, Lys.” He was so close his breath stirred the hair clinging to her cheeks.
Her back was now pressed against the cool glass of one of the mirrored walls. After swallowing the disquiet she felt at his calm demeanor, Lyssa shook her head again. “No. There’s no point—”
“No point?” Mike’s fingers carefully removed the bobby pins securing the auburn wig to her head. He dropped the pins and wig onto the nightstand before he combed his fingers through her hair, releasing it from the knot she’d coiled it in at her nape. “When your master gives you a command, love, you need to obey.”
“Master?” she tried to inject a healthy dose of disdain into her tone. “You’re not my master, kid.”
The muscle at the edge of his jaw flexed at the insulting nickname she’d always used against him. The fire ignited in his chocolate eyes before they narrowed. His nostrils flared like a wolf scenting its prey.
“Wrong answer, Lys.” The fingers working so carefully against her scalp slid free of her hair and moved to the front of her dress.
The sound of rending fabric surprised more than frightened her as he gripped her costume and tore it open. He stripped the dress off her shoulders and down her arms, and then dragged first her bra, then her panties off as he summarily removed almost everything covering her. Then he pushed her back against the broad mirror behind her.
Lyssa froze, breath suspended in her lungs. Memories of her father yelling and his fists striking her mother, Mattie, and herself flared to life. Instinct told her to close her eyes, but Lyssa couldn’t bring herself to do it, afraid of not seeing the first blow when it came. She’d made that mistake only once—the first time her father punched her, when she was eight. She waited for fear to follow, to paralyze her, eroding the sensual spell Mike had wrapped her in.
Soft linen caressed her naked breasts as Mike moved in close, his face hovering above hers. “Don’t ever tell me no again, Lys.”
The command in his voice recalled those heated hours in the supply closet, banishing the taunting demons from her childhood. She doubted she’d ever forget
that
night. Her body reacted to him, even if her head wanted to fight the pull.
“You are mine by Rite of First Claim, and no other dom touches you. Is that clear?”
“You have no—”
His lips cut off the rest of her response. Heat washed over her as his tongue swept past her parted lips and demanded reciprocation. And God, how she wanted to give in, but doing so would ruin all the plans she’d made and end in a disaster of epic proportions. The cool mirror against her back was a stimulating contrast to the furnace of his flesh in front of her. It was enough of a contrast to allow her to maintain a measure of reason to keep him from taking complete control.
The strength in her knees failed, but the pressure of his body against hers kept Lyssa upright. She would have collapsed to the carpeted floor when he pulled away if Mike hadn’t picked her up and carried her to the broad bed. He dropped her among the silver-colored silk bedding. As his eyes catalogued every inch of her body, Lyssa fought the urge to cover herself.
His gaping shirt displayed a lean torso, tautly muscled and tanned by the sun. A sparse dusting of dark curls stretched between the copper-colored areolaes surrounding his nipples before trailing in a thin line to his navel, forming a sexy T that made her mouth water to trace it. Still hidden by the shirt tucked in at his waist, Lyssa recalled that more curls, coarse and sensual, encircled his navel before forming a band leading down to his groin and the root of his penis. In the two times they’d been together, nudity hadn’t factored into the equations. Both times they’d removed only the clothes keeping their bodies apart. Lord, she wanted to see him. All of him. Even if it was just for this one night.
“Very good, Lys.” He grinned. His eyes lingered on her belly before admiring the pale flesh of her mons. Something beyond amusement and lust flashed in his eyes as he visually traced the design tattooed beneath her belly button and within the cradle of her hips.
“Don’t be a smart-ass, Mike,” she retorted. At forty, Lyssa was more than aware of the less than perky nature of her full breasts, the little pooch to her belly no amount of crunches had ever been able to flatten, and the ample width of her hips. The fullness of her figure had been the primary reason for her desire to design clothes that accented her body’s shape instead of trying to squeeze into other people’s idea of what looked good.
When his gaze returned to the tattoo adorning the pale skin at her pelvis, she fought the urge to hide it. She wondered what he was thinking as his gaze traced the intricately etched dragon inked in shades of copper and gold, because the only emotion she could read on his face was an almost wry amusement.